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Topic: Homemade Dough Conditioner (Read 33514 times)

I have a question if I want to try a homemade dough conditioner (enhancer) in dough. I want to make a dough conditioner out of lecithin granules, Fruit Fresh (which is Vitiamin C) and high heat Non-Fat dry milk powder. How do I go about calculating how much to add to dough and how do I enter them under the expanded calculating tool? Can I just make a mixture to keep in the refrigerator and then add them to a dough or doughs to try? I do have all 3 ingredients for a homemade dough conditioner.

I can’t seem to find enough information by doing a forum search on how all three ingredients can be combined in amounts. Any help would be appreciated.

Several years ago I did some research on dough conditioners and found several different formulations, including one like you mentioned. This morning, to refresh my memory I did a Google search and turned up what appears to be a good site on this subject at http://concasse.blogspot.com/2009/04/natural-dough-conditioner-enhancer.html. I think I would use the information at that site to do what you want to do. That website also has a link to another website, at http://www.breadmachinedigest.com/, that has a link to dough enhancers also. Those links might also be useful to you.

What you want to do is strictly a math exercise. First, you want to determine how much of each of the three ingredients (lecithin, Vitamin C and dry milk powder) is needed for a cup of flour. In the case where an ingredient is related to a loaf of bread, as appears to be the case with the Vitamin C, you will have to decide how many cups of flour are used in a typical loaf of bread and prorate the amount of Vitamin C needed for just a single cup of flour. For example, if a typical loaf of bread uses 4 cups of flour, the Vitamin C would be 1/32 t. (1/4 times 1/8 t.). For that small an amount, you may need to use a mini-measuring spoon ("smidgen") to measure it out. For a benchmark value of the weight of a cup of flour, I think I would use 4.25 ounces. Once you determine the combined weights of the three ingredients on the basis of one cup of flour, you should be able to calculate the baker's percent.

With respect to the expanded dough calculating tool, there is no way of using the baker's percent for your dough enhancer since there is no field in the tool for such an enhancer. However, you can usurp one of the unused fields and enter the baker's percent that you calculate as described above in that field. That will give you the weight of enhancer to use in any given recipe. However, you will have to then convert that weight to a volume. The conversion factor you will want to use is the weight of one teaspoon of the enhancer. If you make just a basic amount for one cup of flour, you can weigh one level teaspoon of it. That will not weigh much so you may find that you need a special scale to weigh it in order to get an accurate weight measurement. For example, I estimate that one teaspoon of your enhancer will weigh around 6 1/4 grams. As an alternative to using a scale, you can use the Nutrition Facts for the particular brands of lecithin and dry milk powder you plan to use. But once you have the proper measurement, you can convert the weight of the enhancer provided by the expanded dough calculating tool to a volume measurement.

In due course, you may find it useful to scale up the amount of enhancer to a much larger quantity. But the amount to use in any instance will be easy to calculate once you have the appropriate baker's percent.

Several years ago I did some research on dough conditioners and found several different formulations, including one like you mentioned. This morning, to refresh my memory I did a Google search and turned up what appears to be a good site on this subject at http://concasse.blogspot.com/2009/04/natural-dough-conditioner-enhancer.html. I think I would use the information at that site to do what you want to do. That website also has a link to another website, at http://www.breadmachinedigest.com/, that has a link to dough enhancers also. Those links might also be useful to you.

What you want to do is strictly a math exercise. First, you want to determine how much of each of the three ingredients (lecithin, Vitamin C and dry milk powder) is needed for a cup of flour. In the case where an ingredient is related to a loaf of bread, as appears to be the case with the Vitamin C, you will have to decide how many cups of flour are used in a typical loaf of bread and prorate the amount of Vitamin C needed for just a single cup of flour. For example, if a typical loaf of bread uses 4 cups of flour, the Vitamin C would be 1/32 t. (1/4 times 1/8 t.). For that small an amount, you may need to use a mini-measuring spoon ("smidgen") to measure it out. For a benchmark value of the weight of a cup of flour, I think I would use 4.25 ounces. Once you determine the combined weights of the three ingredients on the basis of one cup of flour, you should be able to calculate the baker's percent.

With respect to the expanded dough calculating tool, there is no way of using the baker's percent for your dough enhancer since there is no field in the tool for such an enhancer. However, you can usurp one of the unused fields and enter the baker's percent that you calculate as described above in that field. That will give you the weight of enhancer to use in any given recipe. However, you will have to then convert that weight to a volume. The conversion factor you will want to use is the weight of one teaspoon of the enhancer. If you make just a basic amount for one cup of flour, you can weigh one level teaspoon of it. That will not weigh much so you may find that you need a special scale to weigh it in order to get an accurate weight measurement. For example, I estimate that one teaspoon of your enhancer will weigh around 6 1/4 grams. As an alternative to using a scale, you can use the Nutrition Facts for the particular brands of lecithin and dry milk powder you plan to use. But once you have the proper measurement, you can convert the weight of the enhancer provided by the expanded dough calculating tool to a volume measurement.

In due course, you may find it useful to scale up the amount of enhancer to a much larger quantity. But the amount to use in any instance will be easy to calculate once you have the appropriate baker's percent.

Good luck.

Peter

Peter,

Thank you for referencing the blog and the website that contains the link about dough enhancers. I thought I would like to try out a homemade dough enhancer to see what would happen to dough. From the first blog you referenced it also says that lady uses unflavored gelatin. I also have some of that. I see in the link under the bread machine digest that there is a recipe for Super Bread Dough Enhancer that can be stored in the freezer. http://www.breadmachinedigest.com/recipes/enhancer-recipes/super-bread-fresh-dough-enhancer.php I don’t have all those ingredients but will start with what I have. Since I had the leftover high heat dried milk powder from doing the other experiments, I wanted to try that out in combination with other ingredients to see what might happen. I thought the homemade dough enhancer would include some kind of math exercise, but I think you have explained enough for me to try. I also have some vital wheat gluten. Do you think I should include that in the mix also, if I try a lower protein flour for my dough? I never heard of using unflavored gelatin in any doughs before. Did you ever try a mix of dough enhancers before? I did a forum search and only found where you used some of the ingredients I have.

Thanks for explaining everything. I will see if I can figure out what to do.

It is entirely up to you if you want to try adding other ingredients to your dough enhancer. However, you would use the same procedures (i.e., base each of the other ingredients relative to a cup of flour, calculate the baker's percent, and weigh one teaspoon of the final blend for conversion purposes).

My recollection is that I made and used a small amount of a dough enhancer using the Ellen's Kitchen blend given at http://www.ellenskitchen.com/recipebox/breadbuilder.html. I never used it again so apparently I was not impressed enough with the results to warrant using it again. I also tried using lecithin separately but did not explore using that ingredient further either. However, for fun I think it is worth playing around with dough enhancers, and you might even learn something from using them. And if you like the results you get better than what you are now achieving, so much the better.

My recollection is that I made and used a small amount of a dough enhancer using the Ellen's Kitchen blend given at http://www.ellenskitchen.com/recipebox/breadbuilder.html. I never used it again so apparently I was not impressed enough with the results to warrant using it again. I also tried using lecithin separately but did not explore using that ingredient further either. However, for fun I think it is worth playing around with dough enhancers, and you might even learn something from using them. And if you like the results you get better than what you are now achieving, so much the better.

Peter

Peter,

Thanks for posting you did try Ellen’s kitchen blend, but you weren’t too impressed. I see Ellen's Homemade Yeast Dough Relaxer is said to be popular for pizza crust, foccacia, etc. and it is supposed to act by slightly disabling the gluten protein in the wheat. Ellen also said yeasted doughs will rise at a slower rate when made with relaxer. Ellen said the yeasted bread will have a big "oven spring". The big “oven spring” is interesting to me.

I think I will have fun playing around with dough enhancers and also might learn something whether good or bad. I will try to do the conversions in the next week to try in a pizza dough.

Lecithin did interest me before, because at one time we did buy lecithin to put into caramel popcorn we made. It did make the caramel corn kernels separate much easier, but after about a year we stopped buying it because it was too expensive.

The tricky part of putting together a dough enhancer is to decide which ingredients should go into it and for what purpose. For example, I noticed that several of the possible ingredients are intended to prevent mold and to prolong life by delaying staling. These are not problems with pizza but might be with bread. So, you might want to first try it on one of Chad's Tartine breads. Besides, I'd like to hear the howls of protest and claims of sacrilege from Chau, Bill/SFNM and John, among others . Also, if Chad finds out, he will start singing this song, venting in his best French that he picked up when he was in France: . BTW, the book in the song is his Tartine book .

The tricky part of putting together a dough enhancer is to decide which ingredients should go into it and for what purpose. For example, I noticed that several of the possible ingredients are intended to prevent mold and to prolong life by delaying staling. These are not problems with pizza but might be with bread. So, you might want to first try it on one of Chad's Tartine breads. Besides, I'd like to hear the howls of protest and claims of sacrilege from Chau, Bill/SFNM and John, among others . Also, if Chad finds out, he will start singing this song, venting in his best French that he picked up when he was in France: . BTW, the book in the song is his Tartine book .

Peter

Peter,

If you think the tricky part of trying to make a dough enhancer is to try to decide what ingredients to put in, how do you think I feel about trying to decide on the amounts and what ingredients to put in, plus all the math part. I might be at this dough enhancer experiment for a long while. I even have some more of those ingredients here at home I could try.

I might try the dough enhancer on the Tartine bread if I get everything figured out. I would like to see what other members like Chau, Bill, John and others would say if I got fantastic oven spring. At least then they wouldn’t be laughing about all my crazy experiments.

I would really be laughing if Chad would sing the song in his best French. How did you decide the book in the song is his Tartine book? I really like that song. In the video you referenced it looks like exploding yeast cells. That was the same song you referenced for what Tom Lehmann would think after you changed his Lehmann dough formula so many times.

Take a look in the RECIPE BANK. I've got an excellent New York style thin crust formula and procedure posted there that has an excellent track record.

Over the years, Tom would refer people to the Recipe Bank for his NY style recipe but I can't ever recall his praising it as he did above or using the term "excellent", which I would have detected given all of the things I did with that recipe and that you extended with your own modifications. That happened not long after your exchanges with Tom. He would perhaps applaud your use of dough enhancers since he frequently recommends them (like PZ-44, l-cysteine, gels, vital wheat gluten, azodicarbonamide, dead yeast, etc.) to pizza professionals.

Before I decide everything I want to include in the dough enchancer do you think I should write to Tom Lehmann to see what he thinks I should include in the blend to try, since he does recommend other kinds of dough enchancers other than why I am planning on using? I could tell him what ingredients I have on hand at home. He might be able to help me decide on what ingredients to try in the dough enchancer if he isn’t too busy.

I am glad to hear that Tom Lehmann said he had an “excellent” New York thin crust formula and procedure posted at the Recipe Bank. Tom Lehmann is a very nice man. I am also glad Tom didn’t get upset with us for changing his “song”, so many times. Tom has helped me many times.

I agree the words in the song and the Tartine book do go well together.

Whew..what a relief that you will help me with the math. On of these days I do need to get better with my math.

Before I decide everything I want to include in the dough enhancer do you think I should write to Tom Lehmann to see what he thinks I should include in the blend to try, since he does recommend other kinds of dough enhancers other than why I am planning on using? I could tell him what ingredients I have on hand at home. He might be able to help me decide on what ingredients to try in the dough enhancer if he isn’t too busy.

Norma,

I am always curious to know what Tom thinks or knows about different matters. So, I think it might be useful to ask him for advice. You might approach it both from a personal/at-home perspective and from a professionals perspective at market. He might have a different answer for both scenarios. Usually, he recommends chemical solutions where pizza operators are having problems that they need solved, not solutions because they would be interesting or informative. You may also find that he is not familiar with home remedies such as you have in mind, although I am sure that he knows what most of the ingredients are for and how they work in a dough.

I am always curious to know what Tom thinks or knows about different matters. So, I think it might be useful to ask him for advice. You might approach it both from a personal/at-home perspective and from a professionals perspective at market. He might have a different answer for both scenarios. Usually, he recommends chemical solutions where pizza operators are having problems that they need solved, not solutions because they would be interesting or informative. You may also find that he is not familiar with home remedies such as you have in mind, although I am sure that he knows what most of the ingredients are for and how they work in a dough.

Peter

Peter,

I will ask Tom what he thinks both from a personal at home advice and also for advice on a my market stand level. I am also curious what Tom Lehmann would have to say if he has time to reply. I will wait and see if Tom Lehmann answers.

I received a reply from Tom Lehmann this morning about the questions I had about trying to make “dough enhancers” to try. This was Tom’s reply.

You say "dough enhancer" in just what way are you proposing to enhance the dough? What is wrong with it making it in need of "enhancement"? Do you see where I'm going with this? Dough "additives" of any kind are added to address a specific problem. Think of it as medicine for the dough. Why do we take medicine? To make us feel better, but before we can decide what type of medicine to take, we must first determine what is ailing us.

I still want to move forward and try to make a “dough enhancer”. These are the ingredients I have on hand at home.

Norma, like Tom, I'm still a little unclear what exactly you want to improve with a dough enhancer?

In addition to the ingridients mentioned, I think it would be interesting to experiment with other reducing agents such as amino acids like L-cysteine or peptides such as gluthathione (contains cysteine). I think both are widely available as supplements - cysteine for sure. They should reduce mixing time, improve extensibility, and react with the sugars in a Maillard reaction to improve flavor and color.

Vitamin C is also a reducing agent in the absence of oxygen (breaks down gluten), and an oxidizing agent (build up gluten - like potassium bromate) in the presence of oxygen.

I've never tried either. I just started thinking about it after writing my thoughts this morning to a post asking for a alternative to bromate.

You might want to take one each of the dough conditioners listed in the SAF document athttp://www.lallemand.com/BakerYeastNA/eng/PDFs/LBU%20PDF%20FILES/1_13DOUG.PDF and make an all-purpose dough enhancer . I also recall from your Ultra-Thin experiments that you were crazy about L-cysteine when I told you that an SAF technician person I spoke with said that L-cysteine was made from human hair .

Norma, like Tom, I'm still a little unclear what exactly you want to improve with a dough enhancer?

In addition to the ingridients mentioned, I think it would be interesting to experiment with other reducing agents such as amino acids like L-cysteine or peptides such as gluthathione (contains cysteine). I think both are widely available as supplements - cysteine for sure. They should reduce mixing time, improve extensibility, and react with the sugars in a Maillard reaction to improve flavor and color.

Vitamin C is also a reducing agent in the absence of oxygen (breaks down gluten), and an oxidizing agent (build up gluten - like potassium bromate) in the presence of oxygen.

I've never tried either. I just started thinking about it after writing my thoughts this morning to a post asking for a alternative to bromate.

Yep. Human hair and poultry feathers. Actually, more and more is produced via baterial fermentation.

CL

Craig,

Almost anything I do, I don’t do in a conventional way. That is why I thought about doing an experiment with homemade “dough enhancers”. I could just go out and buy something conventional to try, but I usually go about trying things the hard way first. I really don’t won’t to improve any particular dough, I just want to see what would happen if a homemade “dough enchancer” is tried. I have tried bromated flours many times and really liked them.

I read different posts about using Vitamin C in dough and that maybe improving dough.

No more human hair and poultry feathers, since Tom Lehmann did tell me L-cysteine didn’t include them anymore.

Maybe you want to try the experiment with more traditional "dough conditioners".

You might want to take one each of the dough conditioners listed in the SAF document athttp://www.lallemand.com/BakerYeastNA/eng/PDFs/LBU%20PDF%20FILES/1_13DOUG.PDF and make an all-purpose dough enhancer . I also recall from your Ultra-Thin experiments that you were crazy about L-cysteine when I told you that an SAF technician person I spoke with said that L-cysteine was made from human hair .

Peter

Peter,

When I looked at the link your referenced for the SAF document and saw all those ingredients listed for a all-purpose dough conditioner, I thought wow, that is a lot of ingredients.

I might need to reevaluate the purpose for each ingredient in the formula and identify those that may interact with each other. I have no idea in what amounts each ingredient should be added. Do you have any idea of how I should start this experiment? Do I need the brands of ingredients I have at home?

norma, I too have gone down this path of trying bread enhancers and dough conditioners in my pizza dough. My goal was to try to achieve effects that were close to what bromate does, without the potential health risk. Ultimately I have ended up not preferring to use any of them, but I think it will be a fun experiment for you and I would love to hear your findings and descriptions of what they do. This was many years ago for me, and honestly I have forgotten what some of these things end up doing to the crust of a pizza dough. A few things I do remember.

I found that different ingredients seemed to do different things at different baking temperatures. I found that even tiny amounts of most of these conditioners seemed to make big changes in the dough, so recommended dosages for bread often produced too much "effect" for pizza.

My suggestion is to try one at a time and see what you like, then make your blend from there.

I remember one of my least favorite enhancers was lecthin, which actually took away from the textures I associate with a good pizza dough. If I remember correctly it made it more dense, and almost a little soggy.

Bakers grade non fat dry milk was one of the best ones. It actually did produce a bromate-like lightness, but at the expense of also adding a very crispy texture and a little extra browning. This is one of the things that I actually liked way better for my high temp 2-3 minute bake pizzas, which can sometimes need a little help in the crisp department. For normal 550 temp pizzas it added too much crisp for me. The milk definitely adds a very nice flavor. I was using tiny amounts....less than 1% and I could still taste the flavor enhancement.

Ascorbic acid didn't seem to do much, maybe a little added lightness, but nothing like what bromate can do. At one point I tried using quite a bit of it, as I wasn't really seeing much from it in recommended dosages. When I did try the higher percentages it just made the dough gummy.

Vital wheat gluten added a bit of air to the dough and allowed it to rise more, but the expense of making the pizza chewy, which is not what I am after. I have no problem achieving chewy by screwing up the mix or the proof

Diastatic malt powder added browning for sure, and I liked how it made a flour without it like caputo more easily adapted to normal temp ovens. The change in texture did not seem to be dramatic.

I have never played around with gelatin, but I am interested in your findings. Also, another ingredient that comes up in these bread enhancers from time to time is ground powdered ginger, if you want to add that to your list.

I hope I didn't discourage you, as I would love to hear back what your take on all of this is. Thanks norma, and have fun experimenting!

My first choice would be the one that scott r mentioned, that is, testing out each of your ingredients individually. To do this, I would use the identical dough formulation (but for the added ingredient) and I would try to make the identical amount of dough or something close to it and manage each dough the same way. I would try to make the pizzas as identically as possible, down to using the same bake protocol, either at home or at market, but not both, and I would use the same types and amounts of sauce and cheese by weight (I don't think that I would add any toppings). In your case, since you know the basic Lehmann NY style dough recipe intimately, and it only has a few basic ingredients, you might use that recipe for your tests. You might also find that you will have to conduct several tests for each ingredient in order to give you several samples from which to detect the effects of the ingredient on the finished crust. As you can see, this method can be a tedious and time consuming one.

An alternative approach would be to try to jumpstart the above process and use an existing goody bag blend of dough enhancers, possibly a concoction such as discussed in one of the articles referenced earlier in this thread. That way, you can see if there is a noticeable improvement in the crusts made from doughs containing a specific set of ingredients. Again, you might use the basic Lehmann dough for the tests. If you don't see any improvement, or any improvement that is worth the effort, then that might be the end of it. If you do see marked improvement, then you can either use that concoction or modify it based on what you get in the way of results.

A third approach would be to make your own concoction based on the ingredients you have on hand. This approach might make the most sense if you started out with the first method mentioned above, since you would customize your blend based on the results from testing individual ingredients.

Whichever way you go, you will want to use the proper amount for your pizza doughs, heeding scott r's advice on not to use too much of the dough enhancers. I would use the approach described earlier to calculate how much of each ingredient to use, based on a benchmark of one cup of flour. Since the quantities I saw in the articles were for bread, you might scale down the baker's percent to use for pizza dough, at least until you get an idea as to the efficacy of your ingredients.

Another point to keep in mind is that many conditioners added to dough are for mass production purposes, such as to shorten knead times, improve machinability of dough, improve dough molding characteristics, etc., none of which necessarily apply to pizza dough in a home environment.

Once you decide how you want to proceed and if you feel you need help with the math, let me know.

I am glad you have also tried making “dough replacers” before in pizza dough. I can understand different ingredients seem to do different thing at different baking temperatures and I also can understand small amounts can make bigger differences in pizza dough than bread. I already tried baker’s grade non-fat milk in some of my experiments and seemed to get better results with using baker’s grade dairy whey. I will be interested in trying gelatin to see what happens with that ingredient. Your idea of adding powdered ginger to the list sounds good. I will get some this coming week.

It will be interesting to see what happens. Thanks for your post and ideas. You didn’t discourage me, I am always interested in hearing of members that tired something different before. Those kind of posts help me or other member decide whether they even want to go down that path.

Norma

Peter,

I will think all what you posted about all the options you have given in addition to scott r’s post to try to make a homemade “dough enhancer.” I also think it would be a good idea to try out 2 regular Lehmann doughs balls no matter what decisions I make.

In the meantime, until next week, I thought after you posted all those dough conditioners in the SAF document about something I already have at home. I found newborn baby kittens in my back yard Wednesday evening. I guess the mother stray cat was to young and didn’t want the babies. I thought they were dead, but my daughter was in the house and I picked one up and took it in. It wasn’t moving or breathing because it was around 42 degrees F in our area. The kitten was still soft though. We started to massage the cold kitten and after awhile, it move one paw. We then started working on it to see if we could revive it. There also was one other kitten outside, but it really looked dead and was purple. I then went outside to pick it up and also bought it. My daughter said that kitten is really dead and I put it in the trash temporarily, until we worked on the other kitten. After the first kitten looked like it was doing better, we decided to put the what appeared to be the dead kitten near the heat. After about an hour we picked it up and it moved a paw too. Well then it was working on that kitten too. Fast forward to today and both kitten seem like they are doing well. We went to PetSmart and got Milk Replacer food supplement for kittens and some small bottles with nipples and also are using a heating pad to keep them warm. They are feeding well and seem to be doing fine. They are very small and the one is now named Chance and is 3.4 oz. and the one named Lucky weighs 2.6 oz. Last evening I looked at the milk replacer for kittens and saw all the ingredients listed on the back. Some of them are what are in “dough replacers”. I then thought about possibly adding some of the reconstituted milk replacer or even dry milk replacer to some dough to see what would happen.

I had planned on making a modified Reinhart classic dough yesterday to try on Tuesday, but didn’t have enough time, because the kittens need fed every two hrs. round the clock. Today I am going to make the modified Reinhart classic dough and possibly another one to try with the milk replacer.

This is the link for the milk replacer if you or anyone wants to see the ingredients listed. http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3480958 I tasted the milk replacer when it was reconstituted with water and it almost tastes like the dairy whey I used before. Do you think after reading the ingredients that this might be a possibility to try. If you do think this is something I can try until I decide what I want to do, what amount do you think I should add to the modified classic Reinhart dough for a 14" pizza?